Sunday, May 22, 2016

Blog Post 3 - Cholla Bay

On Thursday we learned about defense mechanisms marine species employ in mud flats, one of which was burrowing to avoid detection. This morning we visited Cholla Bay, which becomes a mud flat at low tide. When we arrived we walked over a half mile into the bay to get to water which was ankle deep.

When there I spotted a blue crab which was probably eight inches from claw to claw. I and three other people surrounded the crab with buckets to capture it to show to the class. When we were about 4 or 5 feet apart and closing in the crab "disappeared" by burrowing into the sand. We looked closely to find where it had gone, and dug in the most likely spots, but we couldn't find it. That the crab could disappear so completely in such a small space demonstrated for me how quickly even a larger animal could hide completely and quickly in the presence of a predator.